“Cab Calloway was my number one band guy, I like…”

In the powerful, award winning 2014 documentary, Alive Inside: A Story of Music and Memory, social worker Dan Cohen and filmmaker Michael Rossato-Bennett tell a compelling story about the restorative finesse of music, the magical ability of the memory of music to draw out bits and pieces and whole sections of past lives, memories buried deep in the muddled minds of people caught in the terrible trap of Alzheimer’s .

Early on in the film, Henry, who first appears as distant as some far away star, is brought to life by the music from an iPod and recalls, with some prodding , that “Cab Calloway was my number one band guy, I like.” As beautiful and transformational a moment as that is, this film is resplendent with such moments.

There are a number of reasons to embrace this film. Here are a few.

If you are a social worker or anyone concerned about the well-being of people, this film gives a grand example of superior social work in action.
If you are of an age when there is the prospect that you might, sooner rather than later, require the need for institutional home care, you might want to start the search for just the right place now. It may not be built yet but there is no harm in looking.
If you love music or have favorite songs, pay attention now to those songs. Plan to have them with you always. If you don’t sing your heart out now, start singing them and make them a part of your everyday way of being. Someday, they may bring you back from the abyss of dementia.